Month: May 2013

Well actually I’m not that bothered. I’m learning to let go a bit and fit my running around my life and not expect my life to fit around my running. If I were an Olympic athlete then maybe I’d have a good reason for letting running dominate my existence, but I’m not.

On Monday I did my long run. Sunday seems to be a traditional long run day, but it’s the only day my husband and I get off together, so spending half of it running seems a bit of an insult. He sometimes gets a Monday off, but not often, so Monday is now my long run day. It’s official.

My long run was a hot and sweaty affair. Summer suddenly appeared on Monday and pushed the temperatures and the humidity up. Running at pace was a struggle and, inevitably, my pace slowed down significantly. I ran my 6 miles in a slow 67 minutes.

I was a bit annoyed with myself, of course – this blog wouldn’t be the same without a bit of self-flagellation! Annoyed until I read Jeff Galloway’s Book on Running wherein he says to slow your pace down by 30 seconds for every degree over 60ºF. When I got back it was still 66ºF, 6 degrees over. Taking 3 minutes off my time would give me a more realistic reflection of my regular pace, so I’m happy with what I achieved in the heat of the day!

Since then I’ve had Parents’ Evening and a late meeting and a haircut. The first two, on Tuesday and Wednesday, meant that I was home later and decided not to run. Today I went for a long overdue hair cut and until my husband came home I wasn’t going to mess up what had been achieved! He arrived home at half 8. Meh.

So tomorrow, will I run tomorrow? Well actually I am considering another run streak as a way of getting some miles done over what will be a very busy weekend. Dumfries and Galloway are hosts to the Spring Fling Open Studio event and whilst I haven’t entered I’m hoping that I’ll get some additional visitors at the gallery. This means opening right through the weekend and curtailing my free time. By running for at least 15 minutes every day I can rack up a few miles and still enjoy what little free time I’m going to have!

As usual I’ve lost a bit of direction having finished my training programme. On Sunday I finished with a 7 mile run, a run in which I had to stop and rescue a couple of escaped lambs and I’m struggling to find the momentum to carry on. On Wednesday I managed a paltry treadmill run of 4km and it was hard going. Admittedly it was raining heavily, on and off, and I had little time, but I would have much rather run 3 miles through the woods, up to my knees in mud with my small dog snapping at my dirty heels.

But I didn’t.

So, it’s now Saturday night and rather than spend it down the local pub with my husband I’m sitting here looking for ‘The Next Big Challenge’. It’s not easy; I can only races on Sundays as I work on a Saturday and I don’t want to travel hundreds of miles to find a race. My diary is already half filled with car events; as secretary of a local car club I have to attend so many of these during the show season (between May and September).

So far I’ve booked two. On July 21st I’m booked to do the Cross Border Challenge 10k which goes from Gretna to Carlisle. For some reason I missed this in its inaugural year, so I’m happy to bring up the rear in this year’s!

I also have the honour of being the very first person to sign up for a return to the hills of Jedburgh in October. The last two year’s have seen me battle with hill after hill for 10k and last year I knocked 2 minutes of my PB – I want to see if I can repeat that! Sucker for punishment, perhaps, but I like the atmosphere of this race.

I’m struggling to find a half marathon on a day I can manage, within 100 miles. I had hoped to do the Dumfries Half, but that is on the same day as a car event.

So maybe what I need to do is to work on my short race speed. I have no 5ks on the horizon. There is one in Dumfries, but it also clashes with a car show. I’m not desperate to do the Race for Life again (it’s not actually 5 kilometres long so I’d only be looking at improving on my last year’s time.) I promised my supporters that I would give fund raising a rest this year so if I do sign up for this race it’ll be for whatever I donate myself. Maybe “short” should mean subbing that 60 min 10k? I’ll check out my training programmes and see if I can be race ready for July 21st!